Split results for Owatonna boys hockey

Owatonna’s boy hockey head coach, Josh Strom, was left with a bad taste in his mouth, after his team spilt games this week, winning against Rochester Mayo and losing to Mankato East.
The team started off the week with a win 5-3 over Mayo, that saw junior Levi Kubieck score two goals in the contest.
However, the Huskies would not have the same luck in their second game of the week, as they ended Saturday with their first loss of the season, losing to Mankato East, 2-5. Kubieck and junior Taylor Bogen scored the team’s only goals.
“I thought we were okay against Mayo, and I think it kind of caught up to us against Mankato East,” Storm said. “I think we won and were kind of successful on our talent, and we kind of have to get back to the effort that we expect from our players.”Storm says that this week he will focus on a lot of film with the team, showing them examples of the good effort that he saw during the games last week, the catch being that the good effort will not just be from his team.
“I am going to show them the clips of people working hard, whether it is our team, or there is a couple of clips that I am going to show of what the Mankato kids did,” Storm said. “Mankato East really showed the ability to play well. They blocked pucks all over the ice. We have got to show them how our lack of execution and effort are the reasons that we have been falling.”
It was not all negative takeaways from this week’s games though, as Storm was impressed by junior Grant Achterkirch and senior Joey Dub. Praising Dub’s defensive work, and noting how much Acheterkirch has improved in his eyes.
“For a guy (Acheterkirch), who is not necessarily a skill player, I thought he played fantastic. I think he’s stepped up and has really came a long way in the last year,” Storm said. “I thought he was really good.”
Storm was also impressed by the team’s performance on offense, and their ability to get them in games.
“I think the positives continue to be the first two games, without necessarily outworking them, we are having a ton of offensive opportunities,” Storm said. “In the Mankato East game, where it looked like a little bit of lack of focus, we still had a lot of chances to score. Our offensive production has been strong and will continue to be strong. What is nice is if we can clean up the defensive side and play defense first, then the offense will take care of itself.”
Looking ahead, Storm is focused heavily on Thursday’s home matchup against Northfield. He believes that the early season matchup against the one loss team has the opportunity to shape their season.
“I think Thursday is a massive game with Northfield. Northfield beat Mankato East, and I think East outplayed them a little bit,” Storm said. “When you start talking about our desire to win a conference championship, it comes down to we probably have to win that game to be in that conversation. Every game where we play the team for the first time is the one that counts, and if we can find a way to knock out Northfield on Thursday that would put us in a three-way tie with the top teams in the conference, as we would all have one loss.”